MTO 19.3: Boone, Mashing: Toward a Typology of Recycled Music
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Volume 19, Number 3, September 2013 Copyright © 2013 Society for Music Theory Mashing: Toward a Typology of Recycled Music Christine Boone NOTE: The examples for the (text-only) PDF version of this item are available online at: http://www.mtosmt.org/issues/mto.13.19.3/mto.13.19.3.boone.php KEYWORDS: mashups, mash-ups, sampling, collage, typology ABSTRACT: This article locates and defines the mashup as its own genre of music, separate from collage music, hip-hop sampling, and other similar genres. A typology of works made from previously existing music helps to isolate typical characteristics present exclusively in mashups. The mashup genre is then refined into four subcategories: the basic mashup, the cover mashup, the paint palette mashup, and the megamix mashup. Received December 2012 [1.1] Of late, discussions about mashups have been making their way from the popular press to the scholarly journal. In a recent article in Popular Music, for instance, Ragnhild Brøvig-Hanssen and Paul Harkins (2012) argue that a combination of contextual incongruity and musical congruity serve to define the mashup. An article by David Gunkel in Popular Music and Society (2012) makes a different point: Gunkel suggests that mashups challenge traditional concepts of authorship because they are created from already finished works. In the present article, I offer a broad typology of the genre, and I survey a range of approaches in the context of the long musical tradition of appropriating and recombining—what I call “recycling” —preexisting music. [1.2] I will first offer a cursory working definition of the mashup. I will then present a typology that locates mashups amidst other types of music that are constructed using similar principles. Using this typology, I will extract five typical characteristics that most mashups share in order to refine my definition of the genre: (1) mashups use preexisting music; (2) mashups use vertical interaction between songs; (3) mashups always include more than one song; (4) most mashups are dependent upon the recognizability of the songs included; and (5) at least one of the songs is a pop song, usually with lyrics. After further honing of this definition, it will become possible to separate the broader idea of the mashup into four distinct subtypes: (1) the basic mashup, (2) the cover mashup, (3) the paint palette mashup, and (4) the megamix mashup. Finally, I will conclude with implications for future research and analysis. [1.3] Let me propose a working definition: A mashup is a song that combines portions of two or more previously recorded songs into a single track. Even given this rudimentary definition, a cursory examination of mashups quickly reveals that they 1 of 14 do not all follow the same pattern of construction; instead, mashup artists pursue a number of possible strategies. This definition also does not provide immediate guidance on how mashups differ from other closely related genres such as the remix or the collage piece. [1.4] Mashups consist of familiar songs; the guiding idea is to make references that listeners will immediately recognize.(1) The principle of recognizability is important in distinguishing mashups from other patchwork types of music, like collage, in which the immediate recognizability of the source is not generally a primary issue. I will make use of Lacasse’s (2000) distinction between “autosonic” (quotation by sampling) and “allosonic” (quotation by imitation) references. Songs that use autosonic quotation, or literal samples, generally fall into different categories and have different sonic effects than those that rely on allosonic imitation. Another important aspect to consider is the number of recycled songs in a new piece of music. Usually, composers, mashup artists, and DJs limit themselves to combining three or fewer previously existing songs into a single track. Combining a large number of tracks requires different techniques, and such pieces typically have different aesthetic aims than those that feature three or fewer songs. Lastly, I will consider the interaction of samples with each other and with newly composed music. Samples can be juxtaposed in a successive fashion (horizontally), or played simultaneously (vertically). Not only do these two types of interaction create very different aesthetic effects, but in addition I argue that vertical interaction between sampled tracks helps define the mashup. Cover Songs and Hip-Hop Sampling [2.1] A cover song is any recording or performance of a song by an artist other than the artist who recorded the “definitive” (usually first) version.(2) Cover songs first began to emerge in the 1950s with the appearance of rock and roll and the aesthetic priority given to recordings over sheet music; but the term came later, in the 1960s.(3) The traditional cover song is usually fairly easy to define. A cover song never combines songs; it is simply an allosonic re-recording or reinterpretation of an already existing song. Therefore there is no interaction, successive or simultaneous, with other songs.(4) This is not to say that cover songs are necessarily meant to recreate a certain recording: there are sound-alike, or tribute, bands that do just this, but there are also artists who completely change the style of a particular song when they cover it.(5) An example of the latter is the Gourds’ version of Snoop Dogg’s “Gin and Juice.” What began as gangsta rap becomes country/bluegrass with the Gourds’ new instrumentation and singing style. The new song, however, is still obviously recognizable as a new version of a previously existing song. Sampling in Hip-Hop [3.1] Sampling is an ambiguous term. Technically, a “sample” is a short digital recording. The term has its origins in the first digital recording and reproduction of sounds in the 1930s (Davies 1994). In the 1980s, sampling keyboards could be used to record and digitally manipulate sounds, and later the term was broadened to include these same techniques done via computer software. Sampling differs from sound synthesis in that the former’s source lies outside the sampling machine or software, whereas a synthesized sound is produced within the machine or software. The terms are not always easily separated, however, in that samples can be heavily manipulated in the machine or software to the extent that the original sample is unrecognizable, and sound synthesis can be used to create sounds that mimic preexisting sounds (say, a flute or strings). Moreover, “sample” also refers, less technically, to the use of a recognizable musical figure from another recording. [3.2] One particular type of sampling used commonly in hip-hop is the sound “loop.” MC Hammer’s “U Can’t Touch This” (1990) exemplifies this type of sample, which consists of a “looped” (repeated over and over) section of previously recorded music. In the case of “U Can’t Touch This,” a four-bar segment of bass, keyboard, and percussion from the beginning of “Superfreak” by Rick James forms the musical basis of the track; Hammer then raps new material over this sample. This type of sampling relies on a recognizable sample from a single piece of music interacting vertically with new material. Of course, this type of sampling, which Lacasse (2000, 38), calls “autosonic quotation,” is only one of several types that are used in rap. [3.3] Cover songs, especially so-called “sound-alike” recordings, which seek to reproduce other recordings as closely as possible, are often used in hip-hop. For obvious legal reasons and not always obvious aesthetic reasons, this type of cover song is frequently used in place of a literal sample. In fact, when used as material in hip-hop songs, sound-alikes, or 2 of 14 “allosonic quotations” Lacasse (2000, 38), will often be called “samples,” even though they are not technically “sampled” from another commercial recording. In the song “Rapper’s Delight,” for instance, The Sugarhill Gang recreated part of the music (bass, guitar, and keyboard) from Chic’s “Good Times” note-for-note in a studio and then used it as a background over which to rap, just as Hammer used the four-bar segment of “Superfreak.” While the use of “Good Times” in “Rapper’s Delight” is allosonic rather than autosonic, the musical effect of recognizably quoting a particular recording is more or less identical. Because of this, we can consider sampling and sound-alikes as two distinct production techniques for creating the same basic musical effect. To the extent that “Rapper’s Delight” has successfully recreated the sound of Chic, we hear it as quoting Chic, not as a different performance of “Good Times.” Whenever the aim of the quoting artist seems to be to recreate the sound of a particular recording in this way, I will use the terms “sample” and “sampling,” regardless of whether it is technically produced through autosonic or allosonic means. [3.4] The hip-hop songs mentioned so far use samples from only one recording, but groups like Public Enemy became famous for creating “manic collages” that fuse “dozens of fragments to create a single song” (McLeod 2005b, 68). This type of song involves both horizontal and vertical interaction between samples and new material. Hank Shocklee, part of the Bomb Squad company that produced Public Enemy’s recordings, draws an analogy between sampling and traditional popular song arrangement: “To fill the gap where the bass, drums, keyboards, and horn left off, a lot of companies in the ’70s put an orchestra behind the singers. Public Enemy does the same thing, but instead of hiring an orchestra, we fill the space with samples” (Dery 1990, 83). Certainly, most of the samples that Public Enemy uses are not as recognizable as “Good Times” in “Rapper’s Delight.” In fact, the Bomb Squad’s technique works against the very intelligibility of quotation: they take very short excerpts from recordings and manipulate them so that they often sound completely different than they did in their original context.